Alpha

Chapter Thirty-three

Bell puts two rounds into Pooch, and another two rounds into Soccer Betsy, because he’s certain; he puts one round into the S.E.E.K.E.R. Robot’s leg because he isn’t, and there’s always time for apologies later. Chain chattering in his ear the whole time, traffic overlapping, Bonebreaker repeating the message from Athena, relayed via sign.

“Kurkur, Gordo, Clip, and Pooch.”

Bell swings his weapon left, up and away from Soccer Betsy, tracking. Identifies White, Angel is moving forward, firing at the Tango in the Lola costume.

“Tango down.” Her voice is hoarse.

Tango down, Angel advancing.

Continues tracking, swinging about, eyes on Green, furthest away, over a hundred feet, bad range for a pistol shot, he has no shot. Hearing the gunfire as he starts to advance.

“Tango down,” Cardboard saying.

Rip of gunfire, still advancing, Bonebreaker echoing Cardboard. New cascade of shots and then his daughter’s voice, calling for him, and he feels a new rush of adrenaline, is sprinting up the path, climbing the lazy slope. Sees Pooch, sees the weapon, hears Athena screaming for him, hears Chain in his ear, urgent, all of it at the same time.

“Bonebreaker, Bonebreaker,” Chain says. “Bonebreaker, respond.”

Training trumps passion. Bell shifts, throws himself to his left, against the retaining wall along the side of the path. Can smell the flowers planted there, feels his pulse thrum, the.45 in his hand. Bonebreaker isn’t responding.

“Cardboard!” Bell says.

“I’m pinned, Bone is down,” Cardboard comes back immediately. “No shot, no shot.”

Bell moves to break cover, hears another burst of shots, hears rounds whine past as they skip high off the ground.

“Bonebreaker is down,” Chain says. “Bonebreaker is down. Angel, do you have the shot?”

“No shot, I have no shot. Two Tangos moving back, they have a hostage, they have-”

She cuts off, another fusillade, the echo off the wall beside Bell disorienting, making it seem as if the shooters are somehow behind and above him. Chain swears in his ear.

“Warlock, move, move, move,” Chain says. “I have eyes on Tangos, go, go, go.”

Bell pushes away from the wall, sprinting forward, pounding his way upslope, pistol low and ready in both hands. More shots, the rattle from the MP5Ks, and Cardboard curses. Bell crests the rise, finds eight figures lying on the ground, and back toward Wilson Town, he sees Kurkur the Unending disappearing around the side of a building, Pooch chasing after him.

Eight figures on the ground, blood pools, soaks a Gordo, saturating his costume. Clip Flashman lies dead, his helmet in fragments around his head. Smooch face down, his trunk trapped beneath his body, and Bell hears a girl sobbing from within the costume. A Betsy is struggling to get out of her own outfit, her hands already free, a Hollyoakes student on either side of her, and she’s using ASL. He sees Dread Flashman, the same boy whom Athena was flirting with hours before, lying with his arms around his belly. Cardboard is coming up on Bell’s right, Angel behind him, already out of her helmet.

He doesn’t see Athena, he doesn’t see his daughter, and he knows what that means.

“Chain,” Bell says. “Track them.”

“On it, looks like they’re going for the tunnel at Dawg Days.”

Cardboard is moving past, toward the bowls of Rascal’s Tailspin. “Bonebreaker!”

The woman in the Betsy costume is moving now, pulling masks from more of the students, pausing in between to struggle out of her costume. Frightened faces blink up at them, some recoil, some try to hide, and Bell scans them all, and still, he cannot see his daughter.

“Got him!” Cardboard calls.

“He okay?”

“He’s a lucky motherfucker.”

Bell spares a look, sees Cardboard is helping the larger man make his way out of the ride. Three distinct tufts of Kevlar curl from Bonebreaker’s chest, the material white and willowy against the black fabric covering it. The vest held.

“Ribs,” Jorge manages to say. “Fucking ribs.”

Bell nods, pops the magazine from his pistol, replaces it fresh, readies the weapon. Looking over the students, his eyes finally settling on the woman now out of the Betsy costume.

“Angel,” Bell says. “Take the tunnels, swing around to Gordo from the north.”

Angel is kneeling by Dread Flashman, and she looks up at him. All around them, the Hollyoakes class minus his daughter is signing in a flurry, too fast for Bell to hope to understand, the shorthand the deaf use among themselves. Tears and relief and fear.

“This kid’s hurt,” Nuri says. “He’s in shock, I don’t know what’s wrong.”

“Tunnels,” Bell repeats. “Go.”

She nods, getting to her feet. Bell looks down at the boy, the boy his daughter was walking with. His skin has taken an ashen cast, his lips touched with gray, pinpoints of perspiration on his forehead, his cheeks, his upper lip.

“Top,” Cardboard says.

Bell ignores him, turns to the woman who isn’t Betsy. “Dana Kincaid? You are Dana Kincaid?”

She’s signing to three of the kids at once, stops abruptly, looks at him in alarm. “I am. I’m…you’re Mr. Bell, aren’t you? You’re Athena’s father.”

“I am.” He extends one hand to her. “I need you to come with me. Now.”

“What?” She looks confused, on the verge of despair. “I don’t understand. I need to stay with the kids, they need an interpreter-”

“You know Gabriel Fuller?”

“Gabe? Yes, I know Gabe, he’s-”

“Your boyfriend has my daughter hostage,” Bell says. “You’re coming with me, now.”

He doesn’t wait for her agreement, steps in, puts his hand on her back, turns her with him.

“Top,” Cardboard says.

“Help the others.”

Bell and Dana Kincaid move into Wilson Town, together.

Dana Kincaid tries to keep pace with him as Bell jogs along. She opens her mouth to speak, but Bell raises his hand to silence her, listening to Cardboard in his ear.

“One of these kids is hurt,” Cardboard says. “He’s decompensating. We need a medic.”

“On it,” Chain responds. “HRT is at the front gate, waiting confirmation to breach.”

“Tell them to fucking move it.”

“I’m coming down,” Chain says.

Cardboard says, “Top, Brickyard wants status.”

“Keep HRT out of Town Square,” Bell says. “Going to try to talk a surrender.”

“Good luck with that,” Chain says.

“Surrender?” Dana Kincaid asks. “I don’t understand! I don’t understand, what’s going on? Why do you want to know about Gabe?”

“Gabriel Fuller has my daughter.” Bell keeps one hand on the woman’s back, the pressure as light as he can manage, guiding her.

“No. No, that’s not right. Stop that!” She twists, turns out of his touch, stopping in front of him. Confusion on her face, masked with defiance. “No, you’re wrong.”

“Then you’ll prove me wrong. Do you love him?”

She stares at him, taken aback by the question.

“Do you love him?” he asks again.

“I-yes! What…he isn’t, he…” She falters, trails off, and there’s a new look in her eyes, and Bell sees the realization. “He plays Pooch. He plays Pooch, there was a Pooch, he never said anything.…”

“Gabriel Fuller is involved in this, in what has happened today. He is involved, Dana, and he now is holding my daughter. And I will kill him to get her back, I will do that, do you understand?”

Dana Kincaid opens her mouth, but cannot find words. She nods, just barely, then nods again.

“If you love him, if you do not want that to happen, you will talk him down.” Bell is staring into her eyes, forcing the eye contact, giving her nowhere to look and no way to escape. “Do you understand me?”

“Yes.” She swallows, nods again. “Yes, I understand you.”

“Good.” Bell starts moving again, and she stays close by his side now, and he can see she’s processing what he’s said, still grappling with it, but she knows it is true, and he can see that as well.

They reach the double doors at the entrance to the Dawg Days Theatre. Bell stops, looks to her.

“Does he love you?”

She doesn’t pause, and answers with confidence. “Yes, he does.”

“Don’t let him forget that,” Bell says. “Stay close to me, move when I tell you. Don’t speak until I tell you.”

Bell goes through the doors, weapon up and ready, into dim light and air-conditioning that has made the empty theater too cold. The sound effects of a cartoon playing on a loop, the squeak of a mouse, Pooch’s unmistakable bark. He drops one hand from his weapon, reaches back for Dana Kincaid, finds her hand. She returns the grip, and he leads them into the seating area, advancing as quickly as he dares, up to the lip of the stage. He hears a voice, loses its words behind the sound track.

Up, Dana Kincaid’s hand still in his, and Bell scans the arc of the stage, gun leading, then pushes through the curtains. Seeing nothing. Another voice, another man’s, and he advances toward it, deeper into the backstage and toward the door at the rear of the theater, the one that leads into the little square courtyard that leads, in turn, to the mouth of the Gordo Tunnel. The door is ajar, left open during the evacuation.

Bell takes the wall, releasing Dana Kincaid’s hand, breathing through his nose. Trying to steady himself. If he has the shot, he will take it, but when he ducks his head forward to peer through the gap, he sees nothing, just the empty courtyard, the discarded pieces of Kurkur and Pooch, the top of the flight of stairs that leads down to the tunnel.

He looks to Dana Kincaid. “Call for him.”

She nods, takes a deep breath, raises her head.

“Gabriel?”

There is no response, but Bell didn’t immediately expect one. He pushes the door farther open, thinks he hears the echo of movement from the stairs, the entrance to the Gordo Tunnel.

“Gabriel, it’s Dana. I’m here with Mr. Bell. I’m here with Mr. Bell, he says you took his daughter. He says you’re involved in this, in everything that happened today. I don’t want to believe it. I don’t want to believe him.”

Still no answer, nothing, and Bell pushes the door farther open, then slips back, pausing, before moving again, stepping through and out. Gun high, quick scan, and the courtyard is clear. He holds back, not wanting to expose the top of his head to the bottom of the stairs, freezes in place, listening. The park is still silent, but he can hear a distant helicopter, wonders how much longer the no-fly zone is going to last.

Dana steps through the doorway, and Bell moves a hand to catch her, to hold her back. She presses against him, not trying to get past, he thinks, but rather using him as her excuse to not move.

“God, please, Gabe,” Dana Kincaid calls. “Answer me, please! Are you there, baby? Please, this isn’t you, this was never you. They made you do it, your friends, those people you were meeting. I knew something was wrong, I knew it. Why didn’t you tell me?”

There is no answer, no noise at all. Just the distant sound of the helicopter coming closer.

Then, from the tunnel, he hears his daughter scream.

He hears shots.

He runs.